Today, as I read Genesis 1 for the third time, I want to ask why God took six days to create all that is. Why not simply speak the word and have all of it created on one day, in one nano-second? He certainly could have.

When I consider my own walk with God and that of others whom I have known, walked with and pastored, it strikes me that God never seems to do anything in a nano-second, really. He just seems to take his sweet time in things that we would rather see done in a flash.

Creation, transformation, re-creation and discipleship all take time. Process is sacred. It is what a wonderful elderly woman I know once referred to as, “the sacredness of the gradual.” That is to say, if God takes days, months or decades to accomplish something, then there is no other way to accomplish it! To do it any other way, to take any less time, would be to thwart God’s purposes and bring about something other than what God intends.

If I am to enter into God’s purposes for my life, family and church community, it will take time; there is a process through which I must travel. Otherwise, God’s purposes will not come about. Otherwise, I am entering something other than God’s purposes.

And so there is a second day, and a third, and so on. Each day of God’s creative work is necessary for the work. No time is wasted. The very process, even with setbacks and stumblings, is sacred. To know God, follow Jesus and pursue God’s purposes in the world is to commit to the long haul. Are you committed to the long haul? Can you identify with this theme of “the sacredness of the gradual”? Why or why not?

Gracious and patient God, forgive my impatience and those times when my own process lacks the grace I have so freely received from you. Empower me this day to enter fully into the process of your sanctification. Teach me to yield to your Spirit’s work in my life, moment by moment, and day by day. Amen.